Dr. Jaclyn DeMartini is a Senior Lead Scientist at IFF and currently directs the company’s Grain Applications Research Group. In this role, she studies new and improved enzymes and processes for the Grain industry. Her current research is centered on evaluating bio-based technologies to improve both oil recovery, as well as the value of protein coproducts. Prior to joining IFF, Jaclyn received her Ph.D. in Chemical and Environmental Engineering from the University of California, Riverside. Her primary area of expertise focuses on the biochemical mechanisms that dictate breakdown of plant materials for biofuels, including grain-based and cellulosic ethanol, as well as biogas. She has accumulated more than 18 years of experience and numerous peer-reviewed scientific publications on the topic.

Dr. David Wilson is a senior applications scientist at IFF working in the company’s Grain Applications group. David works closely with IFF’s global R&D organization to design and implement bio-based solutions for the grain and oilseed processing industries. His current work is focused on developing enzymatic approaches to improve vegetable oil quality and processing yields in edible and fuel applications. Prior to joining IFF in 2020, David completed a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry at Stanford University where he studied nucleic acid chemistry and high throughput assay design. Through his decade long career in science, David has authored numerous journal publications in peer-reviewed journals and has contributed to several patents in biomedical and industrial fields.

Taylor Pellerin is a Technical Service Account Manager for IFF. His time at IFF has focused on advancing the use and adoption of advanced data analytics and machine learning models. These services have been used for product application and process unit optimization in both the fuel alcohol and carbohydrate processing industries. Taylor has a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Colorado School of Mines. He has over 7 years of regulatory and compliance experience, along with 8 years of experience in production fuel alcohol, production brewing, fermentation, and distillation.

Dawn Overby is the North America Marketing Director for Grain Processing at IFF, working to deliver the latest enzyme and yeast technology to continuously improve the sustainability and efficiency at ethanol plants. Prior to this role she worked in IFF’s Animal Nutrition and Health business. Dawn received a B.S. degree in Finance and International Business from The George Washington University and an M.B.A. and M.A. in International Relations from The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and The Lauder Institute. Her diverse background includes significant experience in the mining and financial industries.

Pauline Teunissen is the Global Applications Director for Grain Processing, Health & Biosciences at IFF since 2020.

Pauline has 20+ years of technical leadership experience in Grain Processing and currently leads the Grain Processing Application teams for North America, Latin America, EMEA and ASPAC. In this role she is responsible for the overall technical product and application development and customer support for the different regions for the fuel ethanol and carbohydrate processing segments.

Pauline joined IFF (at that time Genencor) in 2000, initially in the R&D organization in Leiden, The Netherlands as a scientist and within this role she focused on the development of biochemical/screening assays for new enzyme development and has built the foundation for the high throughput screening laboratory in Leiden, The Netherlands. In her next assignment Pauline has built up the EMEA Grain Applications Laboratory to manage a team of scientists who are specialized in grain research and was responsible for the customer support and product development in the region.

In 2011, Pauline relocated to Palo Alto, CA, USA and held the position of Grain Applications Research Leader and R&D project portfolio leader to guide the development of novel enzymes and yeast solutions for the fuel ethanol and carbohydrate processing industry.

Courtney Bement is an R&D scientist with almost 15 years of experience in the biotechnology industry, specializing in yeast fermentation and its diverse applications. She has spent the last nine years of her career advancing yeast strains for biofuel production, with a focus on strain screening and applications scale-up. Courtney specializes in shake flask assay development for the identification of candidate strains and predicting performance at plant scale.

Gerda Saxer is a lead scientist, project and team leader in research and development at IFF. She joined IFF in 2015 as a scientist and has since worked on the improvement of biocatalyst for biofuel and enzyme production for home and personal care. As well as probiotics for the health business and direct feed microbes for the animal nutrition and health business. Most notably, she was instrumental in the development of two probiotic solutions as a replacement for antibiotic growth promoters in poultry. Currently Gerda works on the development of new yeast strains for the fuel ethanol industry.

Gerda holds a M.Sc. in Zoology from the University of Zurich in Switzerland and a Ph.D. in biology from the University of Houston, Texas. During her Ph.D. she studied how species can evolve through ecological specialization or hybridization using microbial microcosms. After graduating, she spent six years as a post-doctoral fellow in Ecology and Evolution at Rice University in Houston, TX, investigating the evolution of cooperation and conflict, and four years as a faculty fellow in Cell Biology and Biochemistry at Rice University studying domestication of bacteria and the evolution of antibiotic resistance.